The Lost Art of Steam - Revisited

HVAC School - For Techs, By Techs

Bryan Orr

Education, Business, Self-improvement, Careers

4.9 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 7 November 2019

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In this episode from the archives, Dan Holohan joins us on the podcast and talks about his vast experience in the lost art of steam learned from long-dead men.

Steam heating is a "lost art" nowadays; it has become increasingly uncommon and has been disappearing since the Vietnam War. Many people who understood steam heating either retired or died after the Vietnam War. Many elements of steam heating are difficult to understand or surprising. (For example, steam pressure has a surprising relationship with velocity: low-pressure steam moves through piping much more quickly than high-pressure steam.) So, Dan Holohan is on a mission to revive that knowledge and teach the newer generations about the lost art.

There are many older steam heating systems still operating today, especially in the older large buildings in New York. Dan learned a lot about steam heating when working on these old systems and optimizing them. Most of the time, he optimized those systems by removing unnecessary accessories, not adding components like steam traps.

Many old boilers used coal as a heat source. Nowadays, many old boilers have been fitted with conversion oil burners with thermostats, but they are still piped for coal. Some systems now have multiple risers or massive vents on the main riser to prevent the thermostats from getting too hot too early and satisfying the thermostat too early. We call that master venting, reducing pressure and allowing steam to move very quickly and efficiently.

Dan also discusses:

The 2-PSI standard
Transportation metaphors for BTUs in steam
Harmful renovations for old boilers
Replacement vs. restoration mindsets
Gaps in steam boiler education
Monopolizing the market if you HAVE the education
Boiler piping and venting
Two-pipe vs one-pipe steam

Find out more about Dan and hydronic heating at HeatingHelp.com.

Learn more about Refrigeration Technologies HERE.

If you have an iPhone, subscribe to the podcast HERE, and if you have an Android phone, subscribe HERE.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're going to do. This episode of the HVAC School podcast is made possible by our sponsors and our sponsors
0:21.5	are carrier and carrier.com carrier manufacturer of lots of different
0:26.3	HVAC equipment commercial residential all that we buy through carrier enterprise but
0:30.3	you can find your local wholesaler carries carrier by going to carrier.com and
0:36.0	finding out more. Also refrigeration technology is Refrigeration Technologies
0:40.7	makes a lot of really great chemicals. One of the chemicals that we use every day at
0:45.4	Kailos, it's the cleaner that is on our shelves is Viper HD. It is a brown cleaner, it is a foaming cleaner that is very close to neutral acidity, so it's not going to damage anything and it's not going to hurt employees who use it or your customers.
1:00.8	Check it out, Viper HD. It comes in the gallon jug works great nice
1:03.8	foaming cleaner from refrigeration technologies find out more refrigerate.com
1:08.6	also Navac, Navac Global.com Navac has a couple battery-powered vacuum pumps now which are really really slick as
1:14.7	well as their cordless flaring tool to the battery-powered flaring tool to any
1:19.0	F six-lI battery-powered flaring tool it is what we use at Kailos. It works great. You can find all their tools
1:25.2	by going to Navag Global.com or if you want to purchase them now you can go to true
1:29.3	tech tools.com. TRU tech tools. com used the offer code get school to
1:34.1	check out and finally speed clean speed clean is a company that we've worked with
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1:44.0	that we've been using throughout our fall maintenance season is the speed clean
1:48.3	coil jet. The coil jet is a great way to bring water and cleaner exactly where you need it without the need for water or an electrical plug-in.
1:58.0	So that's the coiljet. You can find the coiljet also by going to trueTech Tools.com and using the offer code get schooled at
2:03.4	checkout.
2:07.0	And now the man wanted in 43 states for possession of PVC glue with intent to Huff.
2:17.0	Brian Orr.
	...

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